The Netbook Thread

starshipcommand · Post by **starshipcommand** » Mon Jun 15, 2009 11:22 pm 0

yes... oddly a reboot made it start working

teamonkey · Post by **teamonkey** » Tue Jun 16, 2009 4:49 am 0

starshipcommand wrote:I still haven't got the wireless networking working yet.

It's easy. Under Ubuntu all you need to do is read the HOWTO guide, download the Windows drivers, look up an incomplete table on the web to identify your firmware revision, download the appropriate firmware cutter, copy the stub to the appropriate directory, compile the driver, copy it to the correct location, disable the Gnome network monitor and use the KDE one instead. IT JUST WORKS.

Chuffmeister · Post by **Chuffmeister** » Tue Jun 16, 2009 4:57 am 0

teamonkey wrote:
starshipcommand wrote:I still haven't got the wireless networking working yet.
It's easy. Under Ubuntu all you need to do is read the HOWTO guide, download the Windows drivers, look up an incomplete table on the web to identify your firmware revision, download the appropriate firmware cutter, copy the stub to the appropriate directory, compile the driver, copy it to the correct location, disable the Gnome network monitor and use the KDE one instead. IT JUST WORKS.

Lordypie Teamonkey, shouldn't you be in sleepyland?

seibu · Post by **seibu** » Tue Jun 16, 2009 9:28 am 0

GeeZa wrote: Welcome To Linux.

teamonkey wrote: It's easy. Under Ubuntu all you need to do is read the HOWTO guide, download the Windows drivers, look up an incomplete table on the web to identify your firmware revision, download the appropriate firmware cutter, copy the stub to the appropriate directory, compile the driver, copy it to the correct location, disable the Gnome network monitor and use the KDE one instead. IT JUST WORKS.

starshipcommand wrote: yes... oddly a reboot made it start working

Come on guys, it's pretty unlikely Toshiba would ship a laptop without the wireless correctly configured, regardless of which operating system came bundled.

It's not as if there aren't convoluted methods to getting all sorts of stuff working on Windows.

starshipcommand · Post by **starshipcommand** » Tue Jun 16, 2009 11:28 am 0

It does seem to be a little ropey though. If the router is switched off when the computer boots up, then you switch the router on, it won't work no matter how long you wait, you have to reboot before it will work. If you change the network config it won't work until you reboot. If you close the lid it puts it into one of its "suspend" or "hibernate" modes, and when you open it up again the screen doesn't go on again, you have turn it off and reboot. If you leave it go into a different suspend / hibernate mode by itself if you leave it for a while, the network stops working again when you bring it back and you have to reboot.

Is there any way to "refresh" the network connections when it goes into one of these moods so it works again? I'm a bit of a linux newbie

Cloudane · Post by **Cloudane** » Tue Jun 16, 2009 12:40 pm 0

Usually something like

sudo /etc/init.d/networking restart

Would do the trick, depending on how the distro has tweaked things.

seibu · Post by **seibu** » Tue Jun 16, 2009 1:37 pm 0

starshipcommand wrote:It does seem to be a little ropey though. If the router is switched off when the computer boots up, then you switch the router on, it won't work no matter how long you wait, you have to reboot before it will work. If you change the network config it won't work until you reboot. If you close the lid it puts it into one of its "suspend" or "hibernate" modes, and when you open it up again the screen doesn't go on again, you have turn it off and reboot. If you leave it go into a different suspend / hibernate mode by itself if you leave it for a while, the network stops working again when you bring it back and you have to reboot.

Is there any way to "refresh" the network connections when it goes into one of these moods so it works again? I'm a bit of a linux newbie

Ouch. You have my sympathy! If manufacturers are going to put Linux on things, I wish they'd configure it properly.

It's a serious problem. After buying an eee PC, my girlfriend now thinks Linux is that ugly, broken Xandros thing. Netbooks aren't very good PR for Linux if they ship broken.

starshipcommand · Post by **starshipcommand** » Tue Jun 16, 2009 9:15 pm 0

OK... after looking around on the interweb, I found this which appears to wake the networking up when it throws a wobbly:

Code: Select all

sudo /etc/dbus-1/event.d/25NetworkManager restart

...and I can't seem to reproduce the display not coming on again issue any more, but if it happens again I can always tweak the power management settings.

I like the way you can switch it between slow and fast mode on the fly - (slow mode underclocks the CPU, extending the battery life, and making the annoying fan quieter). Might treat myself to a RAM upgrade at some point, 2Gb is only Â£20 from Crucial

I'm getting used to the fiddly keyboard (this post was typed on it) - you wouldn't want to use it to type a novel, but it's usable.

So, overall, I'm fairly happy with it (not bad for Â£190, really).

starshipcommand · Post by **starshipcommand** » Tue Jun 16, 2009 9:48 pm 0

...although this seems to work more reliably, presumably also have to do eth0 to refresh the wired connection?:

Code: Select all

sudo ifdown ath0
sudo ifup ath0

Post by **gribbles** » Tue Jun 30, 2009 6:50 am 0

eBuyer have some Aspire Ones at a decent price at the moment, and I'm thinking of getting one for my brother who works away from home a lot.

Can anyone tell me what the performance of playing DVDs from an external drive is like? Heard a couple of whispers that it struggles...?

Cheers,

G

Dio · Post by **Dio** » Tue Jun 30, 2009 8:32 am 0

Haven't tried DVD, but I've not had any trouble with SD AVIs. Not sure you'd want to carry an external drive with it though.

ThetaReactor · Post by **ThetaReactor** » Tue Jun 30, 2009 8:40 am 0

As crap as the Intel GMA graphics are in your average gen1 netbook, it still does MPEG-2 in hardware. Same GPU used in the early Intel Mac Minis. If there's any cause for problems it'd be a USB bottleneck, but I play xvid stuff off of thumbdrives just fine on my HP Mini 1000.

The biggest issue with netbooks is high-quality flash video. It's CPU-intensive, and the Atom just isn't up to it. Standard Youtube works fine, but HQ vids or Hulu can get rather choppy. The cunts at Adobe have promised to add hardware acceleration at some point, but probably not for the current models. Of course, if you're using Linux you're extra screwed.

Post by **gribbles** » Tue Jun 30, 2009 8:48 am 0

Cheers Dio.

The portability isn't a huge factor(strangely enough), and there's some nice slimline external DVD drives kicking around anyway.

Dio · Post by **Dio** » Tue Jun 30, 2009 9:19 am 0

They cost a bit, though. I wasn't keen on spending Â£30 on a drive for a computer I'd only paid Â£130 for

.

Post by **gribbles** » Tue Jun 30, 2009 9:30 am 0

Yeah I know.

But we're looking at buying this as a gift for him, so someone will but the netbook, and someone else the drive.

Going to grab one for myself as well, and will just rip the films I want to watch - but my bro' will need to play them off the DVD as he'll not have access to another computer for big lumps of time...

I could rip them for him and keep passing SD cards back and forth I suppose, but I can tend not to be the most reliable person for that sort of stuff

In the grand scheme of things, it's not a major issue but it would be nice for him to be able to watch DVDs on it.

YakYak

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